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Reconciling the Person-Situation-Virtue Ethics Controversy
Surendra Arjoon
Introduction
This paper attempts to reconcile the person-situation-virtue ethics controversy that
has spanned the past four decades. The main thesis advanced by situationist social
psychologists is that behavior is explained by the various situations or situational
factors rather than by character traits, or that character does not matter. In other
words, character traits do not determine behavior. A review of the situationist
literature, however, shows that it does not undermine a virtue ethics approach, but
in fact, both schools of thought add value to our understanding of human behavior.
The two main proponents of situationism are Harman (2003, 2002, 1999) and Doris
(2002, 1998). The former argues that there is no such thing as character and people
are capable of behaving viciously given the right circumstances;1 the latter does not
deny the need to abandon discussion on character, but argues that the situationist
research undermines the virtue ethics character-based moral psychology project.
Webber (2006) points out that situationists propose a fragmentation theory of
character (each character trait is to be specified with reference to a range of features
of the situations in which they are manifested with the result that each person has a
whole range of traits each with very restricted situational application) and do not
subscribe to a regularity theory of character (behavior is regulated by long-term
dispositions to have inclinations of certain strengths to behave in certain ways in
response to certain kinds of stimuli, and the patterns discerned in the behavior of
individuals over time reflect these dispositions). Situationist social psychology in fact
provides a perspective that supports a virtue ethics characterological moral
psychology. Evidence from the organizational behavior and managerial research
literature appears to support this view.
The Situationist Thesis
Experiments in favor of the fragmentation theory, cited by Goldie (2004), Doris
(2002), and Merrit (2000), attempt to show the case that it is situational factors that
play the major or sole role in determining behavior and not character traits, as
argued on the basis of several social psychology experiments. Alzola (2006) and
Webber (2006) identify five distinct types of experiments: (1) obedience to
authority, (2) mood effects, (3) bystander studies, (4) Good Samaritan or hurryfactor, and (5) honesty and deception in school children. Under the first category of
experiments is the Stanley Milgram’s (1960) Yale University Study and the 1971
Philip Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment. In the Milgram experiment, an
experimental assistant (an accomplice) asked each subject to administer ‘electric
shocks’ to another subject-accomplice (a confederate or experimental assistant) each
time the subject-accomplice made a mistake on a word-learning exercise. After each
Harman (2002) states “I believe that ordinary thinking in terms of character traits
has had disastrous effects on people’s understanding of each other, or their
understanding of what social programs are reasonable to support, and of their
understanding of international affairs. I think we need to get people to stop doing
this. We need to convince people to look at situational factors and to stop trying to
explain things in terms of character traits. We need to abandon all talk of virtue and
character, not find a way to save it by reinterpreting it.”
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mistake, the subject was asked to administer a shock of higher voltage which
resulted in ‘apparent’ audibly increasing distress from the subject-accomplice. Over
sixty percent of the subjects shocked their subjects-accomplice through to the
highest voltage Milgram (1974). The Milgram experiment is supposed to show that it
is not character that causes one to inflict great pain on an innocent person, but
rather the situation in which an expert demands one’s obedience. In the Zimbardo
experiment, undergraduate volunteers were randomly assigned to be either guards
or prisoners in a mock prison setting for a two-week experiment. After less than a
week, the experiment was stopped as the subjects were transformed by the
situational conditions which resulted in behavior that included sadism, brutality,
lying, depression, and extreme stress.
An example of the ‘mood effects’ is Isen and Levin (1972) experiment in which
randomly chosen subjects entered a phone booth, and found either a dime secretly
left in the change-slot by the experimental assistant (accomplice) or the change-slot
was empty. The results showed that whether or not the subject had found a dime
made a significant difference as to whether the subject helped to pick up the papers.
The conclusion drawn was that the experimental conditions were the major
explanatory variables in determining those who helped and those who did not, rather
than any character traits or other personality variables. In the case of bystander
studies, Latane and Rodin (1969) and Latane and Darley (1970, 1968) concluded
that the presence or absence of others seems to have made an important
contribution to the subjects` willingness to help the subjects-accomplice. In
particular, Latane and Rodin (1969) study found that when a subject was alone in a
waiting room, seventy percent offered to help the moaning and screaming subjectaccomplice victim who was in an adjoining room. When the subject was with another
subject-accomplice who shrugged off the victim’s cries and did not offer to help, only
seven percent of the subject intervened. Asch (1951) provides another set of
experiments that demonstrate the group effect on behavior and found that subjects
were willing to make statements that appeared to be contradicted by the best
evidence of their senses.
Darley and Baston (1973) describe an experiment in which seminary students were
asked to prepare a short talk on either the Good Samaritan parable or possible
occupations for seminary students, and to walk to another building to give a talk. On
the way, the seminarians encountered a subject-accomplice apparently in need of
medical attention. It turned out that the ‘degree of hurry’ was apparently the single
most important factor in helping or not helping. Specifically, the number of seminary
students who stopped to help appeared to have depended greatly on whether they
had been told that they needed to hurry in order to deliver their talk on time; the
ratio to those who were not in a hurry (and helped) than to those who were in a
hurry (and did not help) was over sixty percent. Finally, Hawthshorne and May
(1928) studied eight thousand school children that tested for honesty across a wide
range of situations (willingness to lie to avoid getting another student in trouble,
cheating on a test or stealing change on a table) and found that almost none of the
subjects behaved consistently across situations. The conclusion was that honesty
was not an internal trait.
According to situationism, therefore, traditional personality or character traits (for
example, virtues such as honesty, kindness, cowardice) play less of a role in
predicting and explaining behavior than do particular situational factors. In other
words, the views or strong intuitions about the status of character traits and
character development are either mistaken or does not exist. The situationist
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experiments in social psychology seem to demonstrate that a wide selection of
people, who presumably have different character traits, react in more or less the
same way in situations in which we would expect vices and virtues to become
apparent (Berges, 2002). Even minor and seemingly irrelevant differences in the
experimental or perceived conditions seem to make significant differences in how
people behave. Situationists refer to this as the Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE)
or correspondence bias. It is a bias toward explanations in terms of corresponding
personality traits (ignoring situational factors) and is associated with a perceptual
tendency to pay more attention to a figure than to its grounds (Nisbett, 1998). In
other word, the experimental research shows that much of our ordinary moral
thinking commits the FAE when someone assumes that behavior patterns are due to
the character traits of an agent, rather than to situational factors. It results from an
apparent inflated belief in the importance of personality traits and dispositions,
together with their failure to recognize the importance of situational factors in
affecting behavior (Ross and Nisbett, 1991). Harman (2002) notes that this
correspondence bias results in a confirmation bias, that is, having attributed a trait
to a given person, an observer has a strong tendency to continue to attribute that
trait to the person even in the face of considerable disconfirming evidence, in other
words, it is a bias toward noting evidence that is in accord with the person’s
hypothesis and toward dis regarding evidence against it. In summary, Harman (2002)
concludes that “what the experiments do show is that aspects of a particular
situation is important to how a person acts in ways that ordinary people do not
normally appreciate, leading them to attribute certain distinctive actions to an
agent’s distinctive character rather than to subtle aspects of the situation. In
particular, observers of some of the events that occur in these experiments are
strongly inclined to blame those participants who did not stop to help or who
provided intense shocks, thinking that the explanation of the agent’s immoral actions
lays in their terrible character.”
Situationist social psychologists are of the view that virtue-based characterological
moral psychology as well as personality psychology, subscribe to a globalist view of
character, that is, character traits are robust and exhibit a high degree of crosssituational consistency. Globalism refers to theories that hold the following three
characteristics (Alzola, 2006; Stichter, 2005): (1) cross-situational consistency
(character and personality traits are reliably manifested in trait-relevant behavior
across a diversity of trait-relevant eliciting conditions, that is, robustness of
character traits). (2) stability (character and personality traits are reliably manifested
in trait-relevant eliciting conditions and traits that remain over time), and (3)
evaluate integration2 (in a given character or personality evaluative valence is
probabilistically related to the occurrence of other traits with similar evaluative
valences, that is, the idea that virtues form a unity). Situationist social psychologists
claim that both chrarcterological moral psychology and personality psychology3 are
Doris (1998) refers to this as the evaluate consistency thesis and gives the
example that the expectation is that a generous person is more likely compassionate
than callous. A compassionate and generous person is evaluatively consistent, while
a callous and generous person is not. Good character is supposed to be an integrated
association of robust traits and the virtuous person will quite consistently and
predictably conduct himself or herself appropriately in various and novel situations.
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Harman (2002) is of the view that personality theory or personality psychology is
in very bad institutional shape and has collapsed as an academic subject.
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empirically inadequate since the experiments fails to reveal the behavioral patterns
expected by globalism. The claim supposes that (Aristotelian) virtues are robust or
substantially resistant to contrary situational pressures in behavioral manifestations
so that a virtuous agent will act virtuously in a consistent manner, across a wide
range of situations in which character is being tested.
Harman (2002) concludes that the evidence indicates that people may differ in
certain relatively narrow traits but do not have broad and stable dispositions
corresponding to the sorts of character and personality traits that people normally
suppose to have. Doris (1998) also states that trait attribution is often surprisingly
inefficacious in predicting behavior in particular novel situations because differing
behavioral outcomes seem to be a function of situational variation more than
individual disposition. In other words behavioral reliability or cross-situational
consistencies vary widely. The results of the experiments challenge the assumption
that the subjects have robust character traits; it appears that their behavior is
consistent within each situation, but this consistency does not extend to other
situations, and even slight variations in the features of a situation can lead to
dramatic shifts in behavior (Kunda, 1999, pp. 499).
In summary, situationist social psychologists reject a globalist view of human nature
(the idea that people possess robust character traits which able the subjects to
withstand situational pressures and behave consistently across situations). They
propose a situationist view as an alternate, more empirically adequate conception of
personality structure (the idea that people lack robust character traits and therefore
behave inconsistently across situations). Doris (1998) outlines three characteristic of
such a view: (1) behavioral variation across a population owes more to situational
differences than dispositional differences, (2) an individual to whom we have
attributed a given trait will often behave inconsistently with regard to the behavior
expected in attribution of that trait, and (3) personality structure is not typically
evaluatively consistent in that the dispositions operative in one situation may have a
very different evaluative status than those manifested in another situation.
Behavioral evidence suggests that a personality structure is evaluatively fragmented
(seemingly insignificant variations in situations may affect inconsistent behavior)
rather than an evaluative integration of robust character traits. Doris (2002, 1998)
suggests that situationism allows the useful possibility of temporally stable,
situation-particular local traits that may reflect dispositional differences among
persons. As such, two normative theses are proposed: (1) people should be
evaluated not in terms of robust character traits but rather in terms of local
situation-specific traits and (2) moral education should aim not at inculcating robust
virtues, but rather at helping bring about situations propitious to virtuous behavior.
Response and Reconciliation: A Virtue Ethics Perspective.
The substantive claims made by situationist social psychologists in fact do not, for
the most part, undermine or disagree with a proper understanding of virtue ethics,
but rather stems from a misunderstanding of concepts of moral character, faulty
conclusions and generalizations of experimental results. In fact, not only is the
situationist thesis not in opposition to virtue ethics, but the former empirically
reinforces and enriches the understanding of the latter. Situationists set up a
dichotomy in that one either views character traits as relevant to the explanations of
behavior or view features of the situation as relevant to the explanation. However,
virtue ethics subscribes to the view that both features of the agent (including
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inclinations, intentions, desires, beliefs, etc.) and of the situation are relevant in
explaining how a person would respond under different situational factors.
Of the five kinds of experiments cited in favor of the fragmentation theory, Webber
(2006) argues that two should be discounted. The first are the mood experiments
since it has been pointed out that repetitions of these experiments have yielded
wildly differing results and nobody has shown that such minor situational variations
affect the likelihood of responding to someone seemingly to be in serious distress.
The other experiment to be discounted is the Stanford Prison Experiment since with
no repetition and no control groups, as well as the extreme conditions (the
disorienting nature of the opening stages of the experiment for the prisoners, the
sheer strangeness, and threatening instability of the situation faced by the guards)
make it difficult to be confident of any extrapolation to less extreme situatio ns. With
respect to the interpretation of the experimental empirical data, Alzola (2006)
summarizes several methodological objections and limitations: (1) ecological validity
(a given experimental finding does not accurately reflect phenomena found in natural
contexts), (2) less conclusive experimental results (subsequent variants of the same
experiments show less conclusive results), (3) extreme and novel experimental
situations (the experimenters observed behavior in extreme situations, far removed
from everyday life), (4) limitations of cross-sectional studies (the experiments did
not track the behavior of individuals across situations; they observed any given
individual only on one occasion in a particular situation), (5) inferences of individual
behavio r from group behavior (it is misleading to infer individual behavior from
group outcomes, see also, Kamtekar (2004), pp. 466), and (6) inferences of adult
behavior from children (it is inappropriate to infer adult behavior from children). For
example Stichter (2005) also notes that in none of the experiments are the subjects
tested in a variety of situations or over an extended period of time to determine
whether they exhibit any stable dispositions. The experiments were not designed to
test for the presence or absence of dispositions and so it is unclear how conclusions
about character trait could be established in such experiments in which character
traits were neither being tested nor controlled.
Stichter (2005), however, notes that in the Milgram experiment, there is some
reason to suspect that character traits could be relevant in explaining results. For
example, what explains that after 300 volts, more than one-third of the subjects
stopped administering shocks at various times before reaching the maximum 450
volts? With respect to the Good Samaritan experiment, which shows the ‘degree of
hurry’ was a major factor, but it does not follow that the seminarians’ religion and
moral views had no effect. Webber (2006) also observes that in the Milgram
experiment, the subjects often displayed striking reactions of emotional strain and
afterwards often reported significant levels of stress and nervous tension. The
subjects apparently acted against their compassionate inclinations and not out of
obedience to the experimenter. Webber (2006, pp. 199) suggests that the
experiment might be better described as deference, rather that obedience to
authority, since in another version of the experiment in which there were two
experimenters who disagreed at 150 volts over whether to continue, all the subjects
stopped at that point. The experimenters were perceived to have moral authority
which does not mitigate against the idea that the subjects were willing to obey
authority. Virtue ethicists do not deny that ordinary moral thinking commits the FAE,
but the FAE is an informal fallacy since the fact that people are prone to make this
generalization shows that it is a common fallacious type of reasoning, but it does not
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follow that there are no character traits4 (Stichter, 2005). There is no reason to
believe that ordinary moral thinking might lead people to view the experimental
results as due only to character defects.
The second misunderstanding is that an Aristotelian virtue ethics perspective, unlike
personality psychology, does not subscribe to a globalist view of character as being
true of anyone who is not virtuous. The lack of behavioral cross-situational
consistency as demonstrated by the experimental research findings shows that most
people, although equipped with some character traits, cannot be described as
virtuous agents as understood by virtue ethicists. Virtuous agents possess a full set
of firm character traits and such a person may reliably exhibit cross-situational
consistency. Under a virtue ethics moral psychology, character does not reliably
determine most people’s behavior, a result that is consistent with the situationist
social psychology experimental findings.
The experiments therefore reveal that most people have weak characters especially
when confronted with intense situations that challenge morally upright behavior and
that the idea of a virtuous agent is not as common as many people might believe.
Virtues (vices) are good (bad) habits or character traits that are made firm by
habituation and practice. Virtues do not determine a person’s behavior, but it
determines the way that person is and his or her disposition, which is expressed in
one’s decision, determined through rational deliberation (Alzola, 2006). We would
certainly expect a non-virtuous agent not to possess firm character traits. Berges
(2002) identifies three considerations that explain why situationist social psychology
diagnosis relies on a misreading of the virtue ethicists’ descriptive commitments in
moral psychology. First is the Aristotelian description and distinction between the
enkratic (continent, self-controlled) versus the virtuous, and the akratic (incontinent,
weak-willed) versus the vicious. The enkratic agent may act in a virtuous manner by
resisting contrary impulses from disordered desires and emotions, while the akratic
agent may act in a non-virtuous manner despite the intention to act virtuously.
Berges (2002) points out that both the enkratic and akratic agents fall short of virtue
(possession of stable character traits), although both to some extent know what the
right thing to do is, but are plagued by strong emotions and appetites. In the case of
the akratic, the agent may end up doing the morally wrong thing because of
weakness of will; the agent allows the non-rational (emotions) to rule the rational
appetite (the will) against better judgment and good intentions. In the case of the
enkratic, although the rational appetite is able to order the non-rational appetites,
the agent does so at the cost of renewed assaults from the rational.
In observing behavior, there is also confusion between drawing the distinction
between the akratic agent and the vicious agent, and between the enkratic agent
and the virtuous agent. It appears that the akratic and vicious persons are identical
with respect to external behavior, but the difference lies in that the latter knows
In a critique of John Doris’ (2002) book on Lack of Character, Peter Vranus shows
(1) that the argument about compassion-relevant behavior needs to show not only
that people possess no robust character trait of compassion, but also that people
possess no other robust character traits and (2) low consistency falls short of
inconsistency. Also, in distinguishing between intersituational and intrapersonal
(behavioral) consistencies, Doris ’ premise that “if intrapersonal consistency is
typically high, then intersituational consistency should be high,” is false and that an
understanding why it is false suggests an explanation of the low intersituational
consistency (http://www.public.lastate.edu/vranas/Homesite/research.htm).
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what the right course of action is but fails to do so because of a weak will. Similarly,
the enkratic agent shows signs of firm character traits since he or she may act
reliably in doing the right thing and is able to resist desires that are contrary to what
is believed to be right, in spite of assaults from the non-rational appetites. However,
a truly virtuous agent would not only not be tempted by situational factors and so
not suffer from violent assaults of the appetites and emotions, but in fact would find
pleasure in refraining from unethical acts and enjoy performing ethical acts (Alzola,
2006). The difference between a virtuous (vicious) act and an enkratic (akratic) act
is that the latter involves a struggle to overcome contrary inclinations; the difference
between the enkratic agent and the akratic agent is that the former wins the struggle
the agent believes how he or she ought to act. Webber (2006, p. 207) observes that
it seems that weakness of will results from the inclination acted upon being stronger
than the combination of the inclination one believes one should act on and the
inclination to do whatever one believes one should do; self-control results from this
combination being stronger than the inclination to behave otherwise. Virtue and vice
involves a greater difference between the strengths of competing inclinations than do
strength and weakness of will. Berges (2002) also notes that, as moral education is
supposed to teach us, a sign of good character is not just when we do the right thing
in the right circumstances, but the agent ought to find pleasure in doing the right
thing and in feeling appropriate emotions and desires at appropriate times; this is
not possible if one is struggling against emotional assaults to do otherwise.
Most ordinary people waver between enkratic and akratic characters, between
performing good and bad actions; it is a matter of degree along a continuum. This
explains the concept of the ‘slippery slope’ or back-sliding since both types of agents
have not yet achieved full control over their desires, appetites, and emotions. As
such, pressures from the non-rational will ‘pull’ the agents down the slope to perform
actions which are contrary to what they believe are right. In terms of the distribution
of ethicality in behavior, evidence from both a virtue ethics moral characterological
psychology and situationist social psychology perspectives shows that ordinary
people are governed by the law of normality (see Figure 1): the predictive pattern of
the degree of stability of character traits.5 The characteristics of the distribution is
consistent with Doris’ (2002) reference to probability which should not be taken as a
constitutive claim, but as an evidential one: an abnormally high probability that a
given person will seek to alleviate the apparent distress of another person indicates
the presence of the corresponding character trait, but the trait could be possessed
without that high probability being abnormal (Webber, 2006, p. 203). Most people in
the akratic -enkratic range can be described as ‘Ordinary Unethical Behavior’, a
phrase coined by Gino and Bazerman (2005) who demonstrated that the majority of
unethical behaviors are unintentional and ordinary, affecting most people. Situations
will have an impact on behavior as demonstrated by the result of the situationist
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Kupperman (1991, p. 17) defines the broader notion of character as one’s
standard pattern of thought and action with respect to one’s own and others’ wellbeing and other major concerns and commitments. It includes virtues and vices,
values and emotions, natural dispositions as well as acts. Hartman (2006) notes
one’s character ought to be consistent and coherent over time and is essential to
personal identity. For example, to be a person of truly generous character is to have
and to want to have settled dispositions and values that consistently guide one’s
actions. Good character is therefore, not only a matter a doing the consistently right
things, but also of having the right desires and emotions, and involves having good
reasons for acting.
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experiments, but only a fully virtuous agent would behave predictably, independent
of circumstances, as he or she would pursue the right course of action without
consciously considering any other.
Figure 1
Distribution of Character Traits
Ordinary Unethical Behavior
Vicious
Akratic
Enkratic
Virtuous
The second consideration is the failure of situationists to distinguish between virtues
and natural dispositions. Although the latter may be termed character traits, Berges
(2002) points out that they fall short of virtues in that they are not the product of
systematic conscious habituation and therefore are not reliable. Having an
undesirable natural disposition, for example, lacking honesty does not imply that a
person never behaves honestly, but that the person does not act honestly across a
variety of situations (Stichter, 2005). Human personalities are not typically
structured as an evaluatively integrated association of robust traits, so that one
would expect to find much variability across situations and not observe substantial
consistencies. Berges (2002) identifies several distinctions between natural
dispositions and virtues. Natural dispositions or traits are not the product of
habituation and are simply the raw material on which habituation must be set to
work. Unless it is made firm through habituation (habitually doing the right thing
through practice), a natural disposition can be improved or worsened, so there is no
reason to believe that this concept of character trait would be reliable and so display
cross-situational consistency (someone who is naturally kind may behave unkindly in
some situations; someone who is naturally mean may behave generously in some
situations). Virtues on the other hand, are the result of a process of conscious and
systematic habituation, which are anchored in firm beliefs or principles. No agent
therefore, is naturally virtuous since he or she is not naturally in possession of firm
character traits; such agents are neither virtuous nor vicious, but merely incapable of
acting according to firm motives and lacking stable character traits.
The third consideration is related to the second. Robust character traits require
systematic conscious habituation over a long period of time across a variety of
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situations, so that people can have personalities without having acquired robust
traits of virtues and vices. Virtues and vices therefore, are more than dispositions;
they lead one to act in a certain way for characteristic reasons, in a characteristic
manner, and to have characteristic attitudes and emotions (Alzola, 2006). It is
important to note that situationists (e.g., Doris, 2002) do not claim that people do
not have virtues, but that they do not have character traits as traditionally
conceived. In the Aristotelian view, Webber (2006, p. 205) defines a character trait
as a relatively stable disposition to be inclined with a certain strength towards a
certain kind of behavior in response to a certain kind of situational feature. Virtuous
traits are therefore not simply dispositions to behave in a certain kind of way
whenever a certain kind of situational feature is present. Virtuous and vicious
behaviors therefore, do not just consist in behaving in a certain way too often, but in
that way on appropriate as well as inappropriate occasions.
In addition, traits are virtues only if the inclinations are tempered by other
inclinations so that full possession of any one virtue means habitually being inclined
to behave in a certain way with the right degree of strength (relative to the strength
of other habitual inclinations) in the presence of a certain situational feature
(Webber, 2006, p. 206). This reflects the idea of a single web of interdependent
virtues or what is referred as the evaluative consistency thesis. Alzola (2006) also
remarks that situationists attribute behavior to a wrong disposition. For example,
Solomon (2003, p. 53) points out that obedience to authority is more robust (since
virtually everyone has been brought up with this virtue) than compassion (a virtue
more often praised than practiced). Hartman (2006) also points out that the Asch
experiment failed to distinguish between the character traits of intellectual courage
and the vice of stubbornness. Others (De Paul, 2000; Miller, 2003) have claimed that
the experimental data are irrelevant to characterological ethical discourse since they
do not view virtues such as compassion to be widespread, but to be ideals for which
we should aim. Character traits attributions are justified only after observing how a
person reacts to a variety of situations overtime and not just in one or even a few
situations.
Webber (2006) argues that the regularity theory understands character as behavior
to be regulated by long-term dispositions to have inclinations of certain strengths to
behave in certain ways in response to certain kinds of stimuli, and the patterns
discerned in the behavior of individuals over time reflects these dispositions. In other
words, in order to count as a character trait, such a disposition ought to yield an
inclination of about the same strength whenever the subject is confronted with
situational features. To be virtuous, therefore, is not the same as dispositions to
behave in a certain kind of way under a particular situational condition. One final
consideration with respect to virtuous acts is the distinction between acting from
virtue (virtuous acts in themselves) and acting merely in accordance with virtue
(virtuous acts in general). Audi (1995) advises that virtue ethics should tell us not
only what is, but also what constitutes acting from what is. Merely to do the right
thing, say, from self-interest, is not to live up to a standard of virtue.
Webber (2006) also remarks that the situationist literature gives ambiguous
definitions of the position they are opposed to. For example, what is meant by a
situation being ‘conducive’ to a certain kind of behavior, or that kind of behavior
being ‘appropriate’ in that situation? Webber (2006) infers that these terms should
be considered as non- moral descriptive terms: the proponents of the fragmentation
theory take the data to indicate that whether or not one will respond to the apparent
distress of another person by trying to alleviate it depends not on whether one is
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disposed to do so, but on situational features such as instructions from an authority
figure, one’s degree of hurry, and the passivity of bystanders. Specifically,
situationists would interpret and conclude that experimental data do not provide
evidence for the regularity theory since there was not a significant diversity of
behavior among subjects of these experiments, and so, we do not possess character
traits as traditionally construed. Webber (2006) further argues that the experimental
data employed provides evidence for the situationist view only if we understand it in
the light of a behaviorist understanding of traits in terms of stimulus and response,
rather than in the light of more traditional understanding in terms of inner events
such as inclination. On the other hand, if an understanding of a character trait under
the regularity theory is construed as a disposition towards certain behavioral
inclinations in response to a particular kind of stimulus (behavior is the result of the
relative strengths of one’s competing inclination), then the differences between the
levels at which different subjects ended the experiment reflect differences in the
relative strengths of their competing inclinations. If the regularity theory of character
is employed when interpreting the data, then there is positive evidence in favor of
differing character traits. Webber (2006) provides evidence that more recent
experiments have shown the regularity theory or traditional conception of character
traits have greater explanatory and predictive power than its situationist rival. While
situationist moral psychology may give us some critical insights into human
behavior, it does not necessarily make better predictions of human behavior than the
traditionally conceived regularity theory of character.
Evidence from Organizational Research
Research in organizational behavior clearly supports the view that organizational
cultures provide situational settings that can have powerful influence on behavior.
Trevino (1986) remarks that organizational culture (defined as the common set of
assumptions, values and beliefs shared by organizational members) influences
thoughts and feelings, and guides behavior. It contributes to an individual’s moral
development by allowing organizational members decision- making responsibility and
by encouraging role-taking opportunities; it manifests itself in norms, rituals,
ceremonies, legends and the organization’s choice of heroes and heroines.
Management and organizational research have also shown (1) that ethical behavior
depends on the employee’s ability to recognize ethical issues and that this ability
appears to be a function of corporate culture more than of individual employee’s
attributes, (2) that people can be inoculated against crowd-induced culpable
indifference by being taught to recognize organizational influence and to act
appropriately despite it, and (3) that individuals with weak dispositions are more
likely to be shaped by the situational features of a organization (Alzola, 2006;
Hartman, 2006;Beaman et al, 1978; Slater, 2004; Chen et al., 1997; Davis-Blake
and Pfeffer, 1986; Snyder and Ickes, 1995). On the other hand, Alzola (2006) cites a
number of studies in organizational behavior (career mobility and promotions,
negotiation, attitudes, job performance and training proficiency, job satisfaction, and
cooperative behavior) that have found some effects of dispositions on individual
behavior in the corporate setting. As well, virtue ethics in business have advanced
the case for the role of virtues, especially Aristotelian characterological moral
psychology in business (Solomon, 2004, 2003; Weaver, 2006; Beadle and Moore,
2006; Moore, 2005 and 2002; Hartman, 2006, 2001, 1998; Koehn, 1998).
Overall, there is strong justification in the organizational behavior and management
research literature to support, not only that the situational or organizational features
are powerful influences on behavior, but also internal characteristics, (strength of
10
disposition, desires and intention) support the role of virtues in business. For
example, Jones and Ryan (1995) bridge the organizational theory/climate with
individual ethical behavior using a moral approbation model (moral approval from
oneself or others) and considers four factors when determining the level of moral
responsibility in a given situation: (1) the severity of the act’s consequences, (2) the
certainty that the act is moral or immoral, (3) the act’s degree of complicity, and (4)
the extent of pressure the actor feels to behave unethically. Trevino (1986) uses an
interactionist model of ethical decision making in organizations that combines
individual variables (moral development, ego strength, field dependence, and locus
of control) with situational variables (the organization’s normative structure, referent
others, obedience to authority, responsibility for consequences, reinforcement
contingencies, and other pressures) to explain and predict ethical decision-making
behavior of individuals in organizations. The American Behavioral Scientist has
devoted an entire issue to demonstrate that there could be a fruitful and mutually
enriching relationship between the behavioral sciences and virtue ethics that provide
stimulating perspectives about human limitations (Richardson, 2003). In particular,
Fowers and Tjeltveit (2003) set the context for a discussion of the place of virtue
ethics in the behavioral sciences, and present virtue ethics as a framework that
makes it possible to break down the standard dic hotomies between facts and values,
individuals and society, and behavioral tendencies and a complete life.
Conclusion
The recommendations suggested by situationists are relevant and helpful in
explaining behavior. For example, Harman (2002) advises that if you are trying not
to give into temptation to drink alcohol, to smoke, or to eat caloric food, the best
advice is the situationist slogan, “People! Places! Things! Don’t go to places where
people drink! Do not carry cigarettes or a lighter and avoid people who smoke! Stay
out of the kitchen!” But to avoid all such situations would make life practically
impossible. Doris (1998) suggests we should try insofar as we are able, to avoid
‘near occasions for sins’ (morally dangerous situations) and, at the same time, we
should seek ‘near occasions for happier behaviors’ (situations conducive to ethically
desirable outcomes). For example, we should try to work with firms that have an
ethically-charged environment since such organizations can provide those situational
features that may promote ethically upright behavior. Another suggestion is that a
decision taken in a ‘lower pressure’ context might considerably affect reliability in
ethical behavior (Doris, 1998, p. 517). The Markkula Center for Applied Ethics (1999)
notes that it is important to identify situational factors that keep people from doing
the wrong things. One of those situational features is known as scripts, which are
short cuts that take place of careful thinking in familiar situations. To address this
potential for deviant conduct, it is suggested that companies keep employees out of
highly repetitive situations or use technology to eliminate repetitive situations.
Situationist social psychologists have cited a number of experiments to support the
view that it is situational features that are the major or sole factors in determining or
explaining behavior. However, the design of the experiments fails to take into
account some significant consequences and understanding of an Aristotelian
conception of character traits and developments and as such, the experiments do not
show anything which necessitates a revision of the role of a virtue ethics perspective
(Berges, 2002). Doris (1998, p. 508) poses the question whether the behavioral
regularity we observe is to be primarily explained by reference to robust dispositional
structures or situational regularity. While the determinative features of situations
have shown to have considerable and powerful effects on our behavior, virtue-ethics
11
characterological moral psychology do explain the observation of behavior regularity.
Virtues do not develop in a vacuum, but in concrete situations and circumstances.
Situational regularity reinforces the development of the virtues so that they become
a second nature. Character dispositions that are not robust cannot reliably determine
behavior, but that does not rule out that robust traits, however rare, cannot
determine behavior. In promoting ethically-upright behavior, one needs to address
the situational features through codes, rules, regulation and enforcement, but also
internal characteristics through education and training, especially through the
development of virtues.
Two related avenues for future research can be explored. The first, as suggested by
Doris (1998), is that virtue theory as understood to be a normative theory, needs
provide regulative ideals that are better suited to effecting morally desirable conduct
than alternatives offered by her competitors. Secondly, the role of practical wisdom
or judgment needs to be developed to better understand and give further insights
into the person-situation-virtue ethics project.
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